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8 November 2015
English 124
Mr. Traylor
Word count 1252
Internet access
As decreed by the United Nations’ Universal Declaration of Human Rights,
human beings have the right to free expression, to culture, to equality, to life,
liberty, and security. Without access to the web it’s getting harder to exercise these
basic freedoms, which makes connecting to the Internet a right itself. Two-thirds
of the world isn’t online, that would mean a big chunk of the population is being
denied their basic rights, which is one of the reasons so many tech heavyweights,
governments, and nonprofits are determined to bridge the digital divide. The latest
company to do this is Facebook, which just announced internet.org, “an initiative
to bring Internet to ‘the next 5 billion people,” by making it more affordable for
developing countries to access the web through smartphones. Mark Zuckerberg
believes connectivity is a human right, and making it happen “is one of the
greatest challenges of our generation. Facebook is partnering with a half a dozen
tech companies—Nokia, Ericsson, Qualcomm, and Samsung—to put Internet.org
into action. They plan to cut the cost of mobile data by making apps, smartphones,
and Internet networks more efficient. In today’s knowledge economy, people and
nations need access to the global web to have a fair shot of economic competition.
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A detailed analysis shows that the Internet now account for a larger percent of the
GDP in many developed countries than energy and agriculture. And the Internet
creates jobs, with 2.6 new jobs being created for every job lost to gained
efficiencies.
Amnesty International made an argument, writing that as the web is increasingly
necessary to enjoy freedoms like health, education, employment, the arts, and
gender equality, which means that the internet is an inseparable right itself.
Amnesty argues that technology is transforming society so completely, it’s forcing
the notion of human rights to evolve. The UN even released a report on how
important the internet is, “not only to enable individuals to exercise their right to
